I just signed a petition calling for Norwegian universities to use research expertise on AI when deciding how to implement it, rather than having decisions be made mostly administratively. , If you are a researcher in Norway, please read it and sign it if you agree – and share with anyone else who might be interested. The petition was written by three researchers at UiT: Maria Danielsen (a philosopher who completed her PhD in 2025 on AI and ethics, including discussions of art and working life), Knut Ørke (Norwegian as a second language), and Holger Pötzsch (a professor of media studies with many years of research on digital media, video games, disruption, and working life, among other topics). This is not about preventing researchers from exploring AI methods in their research. It is about not uncritically accepting the hype that everyone must use AI everywhere without critical reflection. It is about not introducing Copilot as the default option in word processors, or training PhD candidates to believe they will fall behind if they do not use AI when writing articles, without proper academic discussion. Changes like these should be knowledge-based and discussed academically, not merely decided administratively, because they alter the epistemological foundations of research. Maria wrote to me a couple of months ago because she had read my opinion piece in Aftenposten in which I called for a strong brake on the use of language models in knowledge work. She was part of a committee tasked with developing UiT’s AI strategy and was concerned because there was so much hype and so few members of the committee with actual expertise in AI. I fully support the petition. There are probably some good uses for AI in research, but the uncritical, hype-driven insistence that we must simply adopt it everywhere is highly risky. There are many researchers in Norway with strong expertise in AI, language, ethics, working life, and culture. We must make use of this expertise. This is also partly about respect for research in the humanities, social sciences, psychology, and law. Introducing AI at universities and university colleges is not merely a technical issue, and perhaps not even primarily a technical one. It concerns much more: philosophy of science, methodological reflection, epistemology, writing, publishing, the working environment, and more. […]
CW
Congratulations Jill! I work in a library and have ordered a copy for our collection 🙂
William Patrick Wend
I am looking forward, even if I don’t play World of Warcraft, to reading this book! Congrats! I will try to get to it later this summer or in the fall.
jill/txt » book launch 2.0
[…] I should be an expert at pushing our World of Warcraft anthology online, after all, I’m a totally passionate blogger, right? Or at least, I am when I’m not more focused on looking after darling little Jessica (who’s now six weeks old and smiles!) Unfortunately it turns out that posting about the book feels kind of a bit dirty – I’m one of those pathetic academics who doesn’t want to get her hands dirty by actually “selling” something or presenting her research in a clear soundbite (”What was the most startling thing you found in your research on World of Warcraft?”). Of course, not wanting to sully one’s blog with anything commercial is a classic old-school blogger hangup that most of the pioneers and A-listers have got over by now (see my other book, Blogging, coming soon from Polity Press, pages ), so in between nappy changes I’ve been spending a few minutes here and there at least thinking of the many ways I could leverage web 2.0 to get the entire world reading our book. Because of course, everyone should be interested in it, don’t you think? […]